Used car buying advice

[PlaneMan]

Cleaned the wheels today with some of this stuff. 

I’ve never seen wheels so clean, not even on a showroom car. The difference is almost unbelievable.

Before

During

After

Almost no effort required, just a little poking and scrubbing on the more ingrained stuff. Did all 4 wheels and used less than 1/2 the bottle. I’m sure on really dirty wheels more effort would be needed, maybe even 2 applications. If you’re selling/ part exchanging a car it could make a few hundreds  of £ difference.

[PlaneMan]

Just had a test drive of yet another car on mum’s behalf. A Fiat 500. Not my kind of car but a decent enough little thing, dead easy to drive when you stop reaching down for the gear lever and reach up a little, feels odd to start with but makes sense after about 10 minutes.  Even the 1.2l is quite nippy, about 12.5 seconds to 62 so roughly the same as my old Swift. More space inside than it looks. Boot is small though, can just about fit a normal suitcase in and that’s about it.

So mum has bought it. She’s always wanted one and the deal was superb. Under 20 miles on it (after the test drive), registered in April this year and a Collezione trim level. £2500 and her 3 year old Captur with a slightly dented/cracked rear bumper.

[Bob Williams]

Nolan, I would be grateful if you could let me know in a week or two how your mum fares with this. My 21 yo g’daughter has a ’55 Picanto which has been a great little motor but is showing its age now: locking calipers, replacement discs, pads and tyres, all due to having added almost 70K miles in slightly under 2 years. She is a big beautiful girl with a large, long term BF and lots of large mates, visits Malls and music venues all over the UK but has just made the life decision to move down to the Peterborough area with BF. He has a great new promotion to work for his company down there, she has applied for and got a post to train as a Commercial banker. She needs to replace her Picanto, but will not be driving such high mileage now and will obviously soon be able to afford something more reliable.

Her situation was complicated this week when she visited a local Tyre company and some idiot cross-threaded a front wheel stud. The garage that she bought the Kia from, sent the tyre company a video of the damage and they used their own CCTV to identify the Bodge artist. They are refunding the cost of tyres and the work needed to repair the hub and renew the stud. Granddad added his own impressions!? I recall a certain lad doing something similar when I was his foreman: neglecting to spin-on the wheel nut by hand, before using a (correctly-torqued) air tool to tighten. I never did that, always used a bar and socket. Torque loading was usually “FT” which is not “Flippin‘ Tight”!

She has always hankered after a Fiat 500, although she is shrewd enough to know that she should not buy new. I think that she would be a bit disappointed with a 500, but style and fashion is everything to the young and she loves the colours!

I also pointed out that the Kia £2,000 scrappage scheme towards a new Kia, may be still too high to aim for yet.

Cheers! Bob.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[The Duke]

They are all now doing some sort of scrappage scheme bob. So if she is going for new, she doesn’t have to stick with kia.

The scrappage schemes work well for small cars, as that extra 2k, helps elevated the intital grand you loose when you drive it off forecourt. Plus their deprivation isn’t too bad. Given they are not that expensive (as if 10k isn’t expensive lol) to start with.

[PlaneMan]

The space inside the 500 is deceptive, as is the overall size. They are bigger than they look, only about 10″ shorter than my new Swift and 4″ odd narrower. Being a 3 door the seats slide forward to ease access to the rear but you need at least a Lounge spec to get the memory function so they return to the original position.

The salesman was a large bloke, maybe 6′ tall and at least 15 stone. He got in and out of the back with no problems. With my knackered hip I have to reverse out of the back on the passenger side so my left leg hits the ground first.

Regarding the scrappage scheme, the local Ford dealer offers upto £6.5k but that would be on a big, high spec motor. The offers vary massively.

[The Duke]

Both the ka and the 500 (same car) are very safe. A friend had a 500 and had a proper motorway crash, rolls the the lot, she walked away. So in that regard I like them. Especally for my kid or my mother etc..

But my God they are crap. The unless your getting the torturous beposta (spelt wrong) 500,witj uprated suspension, they are terrible gutless things. The 1.3 engine, is good to 40. Then it’s a whole load of nothing. Lots of gear changing to keep it going, and they drink fuel as well. If your lucky you get a combined 45mpg.

And the front suspension (iirc a French design) is prone to falling apart. My local mechanic, talks about how bad they are, and how may ka and 500s he had in.

I’d take the first gen ka all day, and the first gen 500 all week. However I’d give my girl the new 500 all day long.

My girl now wants an original mini. I told to by a new is fiesta instead. I’d want the mini too tbh, but given the size of the cars on the road, a mini isn’t standing a chance in any crash. Even bikes are now bigger and heavier than then lol

I really don’t like the new 500. And don’t get me started on the big 500!?

Bob tell your girl to get the outgoing finest, with the 1.2litre 3cly engine with the ST line trim. Looks the business, but the insurance want kill her. Same with Vx the 2 door corsa (the 4 door is for oap women that bingo) similar 1.2 engine, just as good, and with there sports trim option (don’t know its name) that looks similar to a vxr, but with out it’s 200bhp engine.

To nice cars, that are cheap to insure, look sporty and young, and millions was produces, so upkeep will be cheap.

I do quite like the Vx Adam for a kid, but never looked into them.

[Bob Williams]

Yes I knew that other manufacturers did this scrappage scheme Steve, but she is fixated on either a Fiat 500 or a Kia. I advised her last night to wait until she is 25 before spending more than 2 t0 4K on a car, when her insurance will drop if she keeps up her good driving record. I know that once she is settled down the South Lincs/Peterborough area, she will be driving back up here whenever she can. Loves her friends and family, always adored her dad, who brought up her bro and herself from 2 and 4 years old. That means travel miles: “But it’s still Lincolnshire granddad!” – Yes, but it’s the second biggest English County and you will probably be traveling from Peterborough, in Cambridgeshire.” Kids: it’s a dot on the map, doesn’t look far! Regular Mileage mounts up.

She is also keen to use the independent garage that she and the rest of the family use, except for Motability granddad. It’s a local Louth place which puts itself out for customers and consequently has a loyal repeat customer base. They have a good range of different cars and would find her anything she needs (as opposed to wants!). Dad or I usually go in with her, not to avoid the patter because the two owners don’t do that, but to OK anything they say that she doesn’t understand. At least she has now taken to checking oil, tyres and levels, after the last tyre episode I showed her how to do that and gave her some of my stock of latex gloves. I also showed her how to turn the wheel lock to lock and check the tread depth, gave her a tread gauge. When our daughter lived at home, I taught her how to change oil, anti freeze and spark plugs. She doesn’t do that now, too fond of her fancy claws fingernails.?

Women and cars: daughter once had a hit and run while parked outside our old Notts house, ran outside as the car was turning and getting away, took a couple of minutes. She was raving at the guy according to my neighbour at the time, I asked the questions when I came home later – “What car was it?” – “A black one.” What reg plate?” – “I don’t know, it was a black car with 4 doors.” – “Did it have a rear door, estate or hatchback?” – “No idea.”

Police caught him, drunk in a hedge a few miles away. Banned, no insurance, uncle’s car TWOC’d. Dad’s insurance took another hit. Guessing you might know several similar cases.

 

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[PlaneMan]

Mum got the 500 yesterday and is chuffed with it. I had to drive it to her place as she didn’t want to drive it with all the sales people watching. ?. I’m sure it’ll be ideal for her. I get the fun of cleaning it, clay barring it and waxing it next week sometime. When I drove it to mum’s place someone had put the steering into ‘city’ mode, in other words loads of power assistance. Way too light for my liking but it can be switched when driving so it was. Might be handy for some disabled people.

On my car I transfered my music to a SD card as it’s not being used for the Here maps SD (didn’t buy one in the end) and when I was working through the file explorer I found a Video section that I hadn’t seen before. Chucked a few small .mp4 files on it and they work a treat, of course the video doesn’t play when you release the handbrake but it supports quite a few file formats, which is nice. I doubt I’ll use it much as I have Netflix on my phone and don’t pay for the data it uses.  Apparently it also supports external DVD drives through the aux port, why I have no idea.

[Bob Williams]

My guess is that the external DVD feature will be for those who have DVD players in the rear, for families, Nolan. Glad your mum likes the 500.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[PlaneMan]

Bob, the DVD would play on the built in touch screen. That’s what confused me. The playback would be audio only once the handbrake is released.

[Bob Williams]

Oh right I see: I had the wrong impression. You could only receive DVD audio and video, if the car was stationary.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[PlaneMan]

That’s it Bob . Like I said ,confused why that option exists.

[The Duke]

I’d assume that there is video snip its of how toos in the infotainment system.

They would of loaded them on via the file explorer. The fact that you can access it will be left over from that.

The reason why the hand break will disable it,is because they (legislators /imsurers) won’t want you to watch the ‘how too’ snippets in the infotainment system.

So I doubt the system was ever meant to watch your own videos. It’s gist left over code,that probably should be gone, or they simply never though people would use it, so its left over for system checks/updates.

[PlaneMan]

Steve, no video clips are on the infotainment. It’s a genuine, baked in function. I watched an episode of Monty Python on it.

Not surprisingly it’s running Linux.

I had a message from the dealership yesterday, they still can’t find the spare key so I’m taking the car in on Thursday to have a new one programmed, at their expense of course. They could have just hoped I’d forget so I’m quite impressed with them.

Looks like my old Swift has been sold as it has a brand new MOT and has VED showing, also looks like mum’s Captur has been sold, not surprising as it very few miles on it and was in great condition apart from the bumper (probably a couple of hundred to fix for a dealer).

The 500 had an unexpected test yesterday, 2 large almost 80 year old men in the back, neither could get out of a 3 door Mii without assistance, both managed fine with minimal grunting once the seats had been slid forward properly (not using the adjustment, just the handle to fold them forward).   The memory function on the seats is a must have.

[The Duke]

Do any oems offer a 2 door car without memory anymore? I couldn’t live with mine if it didn’t return to its previous position. It would drive me nuts.

Also, have you seen that the new top end coupés are coming with electrical operated seats. Good idea on paper, but not in real life. It adds about one minute to the ingress l/egress time.

It’s amazing how often you drop people off in a hurry, if you had electric operated seats, there would be no time for flyby drop offs, or red light kick outs.

Something with having 4 teens happens alot. Though now one is driving, she is now doing probably 95% of the teen taxing. So my time invested teaching her is paying off now.

[PlaneMan]

Until you get to Lounge spec on the 500 (3rd trim level iirc) you don’t get the memory function on both seats.

I believe the bog standard trim level doesn’t have it at all.

I wouldn’t be surprised to find that other manufacturers do the same.

[Bob Williams]

When I tested Tucsons in Motability last April, I took out a top of the range demo: electric everything. The motors under the seats lifted the seats so much that we could not get in or out then (before our respective Ops) and had to use a step for the test drive. Once we had our Ops, it would have been physically impossible to use that top range model. At least we had a year with the Tucson we did use and it was a very comfortable drive. Having said that, the iX20 has grown on us: for a smaller car, it has real acceleration and is a smooth drive, despite the auto box. I just have to slow down and remember MPG and that it’s petrol….?⚠

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[PlaneMan]

My Swift is a beast when you get into 2nd, 3rd or 4th. It’s very easy to go very fast without realising it. In 1st is sounds a bit harsh when you nail it, like you’re really thrashing it even if you’re not. The sheer acceleration drops of a bit in 5th, but not much.

As for mpg I’m getting 46.58 ATM with an indicated 52 odd. That’s between 4-10 MPG better than the old Swift and I’m definitely enjoying the acceleration. ?

Unless I’m doing a very local trip I plug my phone in and run Waze via Android Auto, it keeps me on the right side of the law with speed limit and camera warnings. It also does roadworks and Police warnings, like last Monday when I was about to get on Rover Way which goes past an official Gypsy/Traveller/Whatever the pc name is today camp, Waze warned me of Police there so I went another route.  Turned it was a full on raid and blocked the road for about 30 minutes causing delays of about an hour.

[PlaneMan]

Just had my first under bonnet look, there’s loads of room under there, nothing is cramped at all, every thing is very easy to get to which helps a lot when you’re ruined. Oddly the washer fluid neck is very narrow, even though there’s loads of space for it. No big deal just very odd.

[Tippon]

The Duke wrote:

Do any oems offer a 2 door car without memory anymore? I couldn’t live with mine if it didn’t return to its previous position. It would drive me nuts.

I find as a passenger that it’s the complete opposite. Ellen’s new car is the first one we’ve had with it, and it drives me up the wall. If someone short has been in the front, I can’t get in the car. There is a way of pushing the seat back with the handle rather than the bar underneath, but it rarely works. We went to her mother’s for a few days recently, so wanted to put a case behind my seat. I had to slide the seat back with the handle, sit in it, then pull it forward with the bar ?

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